Posts Tagged ‘eric wright’

A couple weeks ago, Eric Wright was arrested in Los Angeles for DUI. And this past week he was told he can just stay out West since Mark Dominiktraded him to the 49ers for a conditional draft pick in 2014. The draft pick is actually a bonus since Dominik was perfectly fine with releasing Wright outright. He should have used the same cannon he shot Tanard Jackson off to Washington with.

“I can assure you the decisions we make as an organization are in the best interest of the team, and therefore we decided to trade Eric Wight, and we’re looking forward to the start of training camp and the players we have here,” Buccaneers general manager Mark Dominik said.

I really wasn’t counting on Wright anyway, so this doesn’t disappoint me in the least. Johnthan Banks won’t have any safety net in camp — he’s the guy now. Assuming Darrelle Revis is ready to go, that’s a good cornerback tandem. And the starting safeties are both proven playmakers. I’m feeling pretty good about the starters. Now if any of them tear, rip, break or smoke anything, we have a problem.

The Bucs also have cornerbacks Leonard Johnson, Danny Gorrer, Anthony Gaitor and Michael Adams, a free agent who played six seasons in Arizona.

Adams has the most experience, but even though he has played in a bunch of games in six years, he only started seven. He has three total picks and looks like a career nickel. Which isn’t a bad thing to have on the roster — but does it qualify as quality depth?

General manager Mark Dominik essentially turned up his nose at one of the largest free agent cornerback classes in recent years. Every team evaluates players differently. But none of those players were cost prohibitive and many took one-year deals: the Dolphins’ Sean Smith (three years, $16.5 million with Chiefs); the Falcons’ Brent Grimes (one year, $5.5 million with Dolphins); the Jags’ Derek Cox (four years, $20 million with Chargers); the Eagles’ Nnamdi Asomugha (one year, up to $3 million with 49ers); the Eagles’ Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie (one year, $5 million with Broncos); the Falcons’ Dunta Robinson (three years with Chiefs), to name a few.

We talked about this during the beginning of free agency and one of them is looking pretty good as real competition for Banks right about now. The pickins are pretty slim out there now. Anyone want Elbert Mack back? I’m not seeing anyone out there any better than what the Bucs have on the roster now, so I don’t think they’re going to dip back into free agency for a corner unless someone gets hurt in camp. But cornerbacks are known to stay pretty healthy, right?

The Bucs’ top draft pick, the easy-to-pronounce-but-silly-to-spell Johnthan Banks, signed his rookie deal yesterday, leaving only third-round quarterback Mike Glennon still unsigned. It’s a little unusual to have your last unsigned draft pick be a third-rounder, but Glennon’s agent may think he deserves more because he’s a quarterback, which I think is adorable. In the end, he will get whatever Mark Dominik decides to give him. If he’s lucky, Glennon won’t have a clause in his contract that compels him to bow whenever he passes Dominik in the hall. He’s done it before.

As far as Banks, it looks like the worst he’ll end up with is the nickel corner position to start the season. Depending on how training camp goes for Eric Wright and whether Darrelle Revis‘s knee, you know, starts working or not, he could be a starter. The Wright/Banks competition should be one of the more interesting battles this August.

According to a report by Mike Florio in Profootballtalk.com, the trade talks between the Jets and Tampa Bay for cornerback Darrelle Revis have included the possibility of the Bucs assuming Mark Sanchez and his contract.

You might think I’m about to rag on Sanchez and say the Bucs shouldn’t take him. And you’d be half right because Sanchez is awful. Not an awful person since I don’t know him (although I’ve heard he’s a douche when you meet him) but an awful quarterback. But if the Bucs can restructure Sanchez’s contract so it’s more in line with what a likely backup makes and doesn’t include $8.25-million guaranteed, then he’s a better option than any of the other backups that are out there and would actually provide a perceived threat for Josh Freeman. Not an actual threat, of course, since Freeman is ten times better than Sanchez, but for some reason people keep thinking that Sanchez is good. Freeman knows Dan Orlovsky isn’t going to unseat him, but maybe Sanchez gets his attention a little more.

This is all assuming that including Sanchez as part of the Revis trade is to make it more equitable for the Bucs. If the Bucs are considering giving ANYTHING additional up for Sanchez, they should walk away now. They probably should anyway.

In other New York news, Da’Quan Bowers pled guilty to a minor charge of disorderly conduct and all the gun charges were dropped. Let this be a reminder to all of you to check your luggage for guns before you start packing for a trip. I suggest just jamming your hand into your bags blindly an feeling around for them.

The Bucs added a chicken nugget of camp meat in Eric Page, an undrafted free agent from 2012 who spend that year at home injured after receiving a settlement from the Broncos.

Did you know Eric Wright has a web site? In this blog entry, he explains the process of his restructure, his injury and conveys his gratitude several times to everyone involved. He’s saying all the right things. As long as he doesn’t take any of the wrong meds, I’m cool with it.

No, it’s the other Steve Smith, the one who played for the Giants and then for the Rams, but I kind of like this move. He’s an experienced guy who has had a big season for Eli Manning. His drawback is that he’s short and generally only plays nine or so games per year. But put him up against Kevin Ogletree and Tiquan Underwood and see who comes out on top for the #3 receiver. It should be a fun battle at camp.

Speaking of competition, the Bucs also signed Nate Kaeding, likely just to let Connor Barth know that he’s not irreplaceable. There’s not much chance Kaeding will beat out Barth in camp, but Kaeding’s career FG percentage is a little better than Barth’s, and every now and then Mark Dominik will get a wild hair on his ass and do something crazy like keep Mike Nugent instead of Matt Bryant, so you never know. But I like this level of competition for Barth better than just signing some undrafted free agent kicker which is what they usually do.

It also is looking more likely that the Bucs will keep Eric Wright under a different contract.

But the team’s current lack of options at cornerback and Wright’s understanding that the free-agent market currently is tough for cornerbacks has created a situation where the two sides’ interests have aligned.

The team’s lack of options at corner is entirely the team’s fault. There were a shitload of good corners available and the Bucs passed on all of them. Nnamdi Asomugha just signed with San Francisco for a one-year, $3-million MAX contract — none of which is guaranteed. His salary is $1.65-million and the rest is incentives. But the Bucs would rather have kept Wright? I’m sure Dominik has done his research and knows what he’s doing, but I’d really like to know what was so unattractive about Asomugha or any of the other corners that have already been snatched up for practically nothing and what is so great about Wright that they think he’s their best option. It’s baffling to me.

The only Bucs news happening right now is non-news and it involves cornerbacks not doing anything. Eric Wright is on the trading block but it’s silly to think any team will give up anything more than a free buffet coupon for him since there are still a ton of decent corners on the market already and Wright is one Pepsi Max away from a year-long suspension. Also, Ronde Barber told NFL Network today that he doesn’t know if he’s coming back and he has as long as he wants to think it over. Oh, and Darrelle Revis may not even be available for a trade since the Jets have no idea what they want for him. Wasn’t free agency supposed to be more fun than this?

(If that free buffet coupon is from Shoney’s, though, it might be worth it. Good french toast.)

If you didn’t think the Bucs’ cornerback situation could get any worse, you don’t have enough faith. The Redskins signed away E.J. Biggers, the only cornerback on the team qualified to start that hasn’t been busted for using “Adderall”. I”m going to go ahead and just copy and paste the Bucs’ current cornerback roster because you probably wouldn’t believe me if I told you who was on it.

Gorrer and Johnson have each had their moments and have potential as developmental projects, but neither is a legitimate starter now. I have honestly never heard of James Rogers and think he may just be a name the Bucs made up to fill out the roster. Tandy has made a total of 3 tackles in his NFL career. We already discussed Motorhead. Gaitor is in the same category as Gorrer and Johnson, although he may have a higher ceiling. And Lewis has been given every opportunity and still can’t seem to get on the field even though the three aforementioned non-qualified starters can.

And I know I railed against trading for Darrelle Revis, and I still think it’s a bad idea. But at least it’s an idea. I mean, if the trade goes down, they would have something to work towards and look forward to, right? That deal looked dead a couple days ago, but now it appears to have picked up some steam.

A source “close to the negotiations” between the New York Jets and Tampa Bay Buccaneers tells King that the Bucs likely would be willing to give their first- and second-round picks in the 2014 NFL Draft for Revis. The Jets are expected to get no less than first- and third-round picks in a possible deal, according to King.

The Bucs want the first round pick to come in 2014 and the Jets want this year’s pick. That’s the hold up. Otherwise, it sounds like the Bucs really want to get this done.

Both King and the New York Daily News indicate that the Bucs are willing to pay Revis big money. They are willing to give up valuable picks. They clearly want Revis. It shouldn’t be that hard to settle on what the picks are before the NFL draft.

So that explains why they haven’t snagged one of the several respectable corners left on the market. But it’s not like they don’t need a couple options. They could get Revis, Nnamdi Asomougha and still select a corner relatively high in the draft and be justified in doing it because you know those older guys are only a one or two year Band-Aid.

If the Bucs don’t do something about the corner situation, I recommend just blitzing 11 on every play. The first couple times they did it, at least it would be fun to watch.

The Bucs lost two former starters and current backups today when they put both Cody Grimm and Jeremy Trueblood on injured reserve. Grimm has a hamstring injury that’s been bothering him for a couple games and Trueblood evidently injured his shoulder in the Falcons game, although I don’t ever recall seeing him on the field. It may very well have happened when he put on his pads or pumped his fist in celebration of something. If you were really looking forward to seeing Trueblood in a Bucs uniform in person just just hadn’t found the time to buy tickets, you may have missed your chance forever. I’m going to go out on a huge limb here and say that Trueblood will be playing for a different team in 2013. He’s got lots of starting experience and makes a good backup at right tackle, but that’s evidently all he can play and backups have to be more versatile than that. There are teams that will scrap their offensive lines in the offseason (Chicago, Green Bay, possibly Pittsburgh to a degree) and Trueblood will be a decent option for them.

And as long as we’re making do without certain players, we might as well throw in the announcement that Eric Wright has been suspended for four games for that Adderall thing from a few weeks ago.

“This is the result of taking Adderall at the end of July for health issues I was experiencing,” Wright said. “I am extremely disappointed that the suspension was upheld at my appeal.

“I apologize to the Glazer family, general manager Mark Dominik, Coach (Greg) Schiano and the entire Tampa Bay Buccaneers organization, my teammates, our great fans and my family who have stood by me through this entire process. I will continue to prepare myself and look forward to rejoining the team.”

The Bucs are still dead last in the league in pass defense and this doesn’t help. And they’re not just going to suddenly get better. The only way to improve this is right now is to get a better pass rush going and force bad throws. Seriously, I think Julio Jones is still running.

Word came out on Sunday that Eric Wrightpossibly tested positive for Adderall and if so will be suspended once all the formalities are worked out and he stops twitching uncontrollably. I say “possibly” because no one really knows and no one ever will know because that’s the rules of the PED policy. For now, he was seen riding a stationary bike on the practice field on Monday, which means he hasn’t been suspended yet. And Greg Schiano hasn’t been a book of knowledge on the subject either.

“I really can’t discuss it and neither can Eric,” Schiano said at the start of his news conference Monday. “I’m not trying to be evasive at all, but that’s what comes down from the league and that’s where I’m going to be.

“You saw he was on the bike. He has an Achilles (injury) coming out of the game that is a little bit of a concern. Didn’t know about it after the game, really didn’t know about it until recently. But I think the injury, he’ll be okay, but I can’t predict.”

Presumably Wright would be allowed to practice if he was healthy even with the suspension looming. Schiano has already said he would welcome back Aqib Talib after his Adderall suspension and that guy’s a mess. Wright, by comparison, doesn’t get all punchy when you do things like look at him funny or drive him places. So it looks like Wright will likely be out on Sunday for one reason or another. And that leaves the starting cornerbacks as E.J. Biggers and Myron Lewis with Leonard Johnson in nickel. Individually, I don’t mind having any of them on the field. But together with no superiorly talented player to lean on, it’s a little spooky. Biggers has flashed hot and cold, most recently cold. Johnson had a nice game last week but is woefully inexperienced. And Lewis has never proven he can be a consistent player. And I was concerned about the secondary before this.

What the fuck is up with Adderall anyway? I understand it’s supposed to allow you to maintain focus and also has some physical benefits, but so do a lot of other drugs on the banned substance list and everyone seems to be staying away from most of those. Its name is written very clearly on page 18, and not in some weird foreign language. But for some reason, guys seem to think they can get away with this particular banned drug. I know for a fact that One Buc has a coffee machine. Use it. Get more sleep at night, wake up earlier and do your cardio before team meetings, whatever. This just seems like the dumbest thing to get in trouble for.

SHIPLEY ON PUNT RETURNS AFTER ALL: If there was any doubt that Greg Schiano reads this blog and then takes time out of his day to personally mock me, it was erased yesterday. First I said last week that all the penalties the Bucs are committing are going to infuriate Schiano, then he declares that penalties aren’t so bad and he wants to have at least a few. Now, after my comment that Jordan Shipley doesn’t do special teams, we have this:

Look for Shipley to also field some punts, Schiano saying he has been a “natural under the ball in punt returns.” That’s where he might be able to help the team, which would not mind pushing Preston Parker because of his tendency to mishandle kicks.

Shipley said he would relish the chance to return punts.

Am I implying that just because I see this pattern that it’s all about me? No, I’m saying it outright. It’s all about me.

RETURNING FROM INJURY: Some of the players who were held out of or injured in previous games/practices should see some playing time tonight. LeGarrette Blount went down against the Titans and it looked bad for a minute, but it was just a strain on his groin and he’s okay now. Eric Wright left Tuesday’s practice with an unspecified injury (this guy’s medical file is guarded by the NSA), but he’s back. And Luke Stocker sat out most of this week’s practices with an acute case of awesomeness. He will also play tonight.

COUNTDOWN TO STUPIDITY: Greg Schiano installed a clock in the Bucs’ locker room that is counting down the time until the regular season kicks off — by tenths of a second. Which is fine. It’s better than toting around a rock or an ax or a ceramic orange dog (come on, Dooley…). But Tom Jones used it as a jumping off point to start predicting doom and gloom before Schiano has coached even one regular season snap.

The clock also underscores how much information, conditioning and personality Schiano is trying to cram into his team in such a short period of time. You can’t help but wonder if it’s all too much. You can’t help but wonder if at some point, the team might start stuttering, sputtering and smoking and suffer some sort of system overload.

Because God knows last year worked out so well with the coach acting more like a senior RA and enforcing those grueling none-a-days. With the new CBA, it’s virtually impossible to overwork football players. I think the team gets fined now if they don’t have an open bar on the field. But without any real evidence, Jones just asks a series of ominous questions designed to scare us and provide evidence later on that he is a visionary because he predicted a rookie head coach wouldn’t win the Super Bowl.

The clock is ticking. Many questions remain unanswered, including the scariest of all:

What if it doesn’t work?

I dunno, maybe the Bucs fire Schiano and hire someone else, the same thing six or seven teams do every single year? Sounds about right. And then we all go on with our lives? Schiano isn’t fighting Satan’s Apocalyptic Army of the Damned or the Legion of Doom. No one’s going to die if his methods fail.

I also like how the article basically puts Schiano on the hot seat in his rookie year. It didn’t take long for the hate to kick into high gear this season.

BUTCH DAVIS EXPOSED!: Actually, we knew all this stuff months ago about Davis’s issues at UNC and why he’s in Tampa now as a special assistant and not actually coaching. I was just trying to get your attention. In retrospect, it’s kind of a big screw you to anyone who thought I had uncovered some fresh new dirt or a Davis nip slip. Anyway, the article is a good summary of his entire career and a good way to catch up on his UNC issues if you had fallen behind.

ERIC LEGRAND GUEST WRITING: Peter King is on vacation (ooh, I wonder if he’ll have coffee!) and is having guest writers fill in for him in his MMQB series. Yesterday, Eric LeGrand was tapped as King’s fill-in. LeGrand discusses the Bucs, Greg Schiano, his appearance at the ESPYs, his medical progress to date, and several other topics. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that LeGrand’s version of MMQB is 84-billion times more interesting than King’s. I might even be underselling it a little. And I’m guessing these are the same thoughts people had about this site last week.

ERIC WRIGHT GETTING TIGHT: Now that Eric Wright has been cleared of those DUI charges, he is focused on training for the season. Doug Farrar has a surprisingly long article about Wright and his preparation for camp.

“For me, I’m trying to be a little slimmer, and a lot more lean,” Wright said. “Which is different for me, going into my sixth year. As opposed to the other years, when I was trying to pack on more weight, because it was hard for me to hold the weight. Now that I’m older, and Travelle’s been through the offseasons with me, he’s watched me grow as an athlete. Now that I can hold the weight, we keep it tight and slim, and that’s a focus for me this offseason.”

Not a word mentioned about his illness or whatever kept him out of a lot of the offseason program, but no one will care if he shows up to camp and impresses right away. But he should probably still wear a name tag for the first day or two.